


Dogs in the Moonlight

by vamm_goda



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Claude is turned into a dog, Crack Treated Seriously, Danny Briere is such a nurturer, Dom/sub Undertones, Hand Wavey Magic, M/M, Mike Richards is an awesome Captain, Sidney Crosby plans ahead, Transmogrification, What Was I Thinking?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-06-14
Updated: 2011-06-14
Packaged: 2018-04-06 18:08:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,592
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4231680
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vamm_goda/pseuds/vamm_goda
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After a fight Danny wakes up to find that instead of Claude, he’s sharing his bed with an Irish Setter.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dogs in the Moonlight

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Paul Simon's You Can Call Me Al, because he is my Danny/Claude muse.
> 
> An older piece, originally a prompt fill that asked for something funny and cracky involving Danny needing to take care of Claude. Claude is magically turned into a dog. No sexing occurs while he is in his dog form. Sidney Crosby is terribly OOC, because this was written long before I cared about his characterization.

"I'm not a kid!" Claude's voice comes out sharp and irritated, almost a growl, and Danny reels back. His eyes get wide and worried, apology starting to roll off his tongue but Claude turns away, arms crossed over his chest.

"I'm not one of your sons, Danny. I have a father, and he's awesome. Don't pull this with me. I don't need your help. I did fine before I moved in."

You were miserable, Danny wants to say. But instead he just nods, lowers his eyes at the offending cereal bowl and sets it back down for Claude to clean up. Fine, Claude doesn’t want him trailing after him, dealing with his messes, he won’t. It’s no skin off his nose one way or another.

Claude’s still standing in the kitchen, arms crossed over his chest and legs apart, a fighting pose. Danny pushes past him to the stairs, not saying a further word. There’s nothing that needs to be said, nothing that bridges the angry, silent belligerence in Claude’s posture as he watches him go.

“The boys are back tomorrow,” he says over his shoulder like a peace offering when he can’t stand the silence any longer. “We . . .”

Claude continues to stand, quiet. Danny has forgotten, sometimes, the persistence of anger when you’re young. He’s had too much time being angry in his life; it burns hot and passes. Claude smolders, clenched tight inside and red like an ember, and he knows there’s not going to be any reconciliation, not tonight. Not for a while, with the boys home.

Danny falls asleep on his side, back to the open door. He knows when Claude pauses in the door, watches him; he can feel his gaze between his shoulder blades, and he lays still as though inviting Claude to snuggle into his back. Then he hears Claude’s door, the door to his bedroom, the one he rarely uses anymore, and closes his eyes with a sharp sigh, fists clenched under the covers.

 _Stupid, he doesn’t need your constant help._ It’s the last thing he thinks before he sleeps, before his dreams are dark and angry and broiling inside his head.

When Danny wakes up it’s morning. It’s bright morning, in fact, the sun shining into his eyes and he blinks, shaking his hair out of his face so he can try to think. Mornings are never easy, never enjoyable, and he has only a few seconds to register anything before he hears feet pounding up the stairs.

The boys are home early, and he’s not letting Sylvie see him still in bed. She’d be silently smug for days.

The second thing that registers is a warm weight against his back, and Danny reaches back to shove Zoey away from his body so he can get up. However, instead of her mink soft coat his fingers bury into fur, thick fur that feels plush and soft, like silk against his fingers. He rolls over to find a dog that he’s positive he didn’t own yesterday laying on the bed staring at him with doleful hazel eyes, reddish gold fur glimmering in the bright sunlight.

“We got a new dog?” Caelan’s standing in the door, his brothers behind him. His eyes are huge and round, showing white almost all the way around, and Danny stares down uncomprehendingly. He has to say something. He has to salvage the situation somehow, he’s the father.

“Um. Surprise?”

\\\

Danny has no idea how the puppy got here. After a few moments spent trying to be awake he’d checked the doors while the kids flounced all over the puppy and Sylvie watched, looking vaguely disapproving.

“We didn’t discuss this,” she says softly, arms by her sides. “What are you going to do when you have away games? I can’t take care of another dog, Daniel. This wasn’t a fair decision.”

He wants, very badly, to tell her that she forfeited her right to have a say in any part of his life quite a while ago, but she has a certain point that he would concede to her if he could just figure out how the puppy got here.

“He’s um. He’s Claude’s,” he decides after a moment and another long look at the door to the back yard. “He. Uh. He really wanted a chance to have a dog of his own. Don’t worry, Reemer’s mom said she’d watch him while we’re gone.” As a lie it has the downside of being incredibly implausible, but sometimes he has no say over what comes out of his mouth when he’s under pressure.

“Claude got a puppy?”

“Yes. He um. He said he wanted one that was his.”

Sylvie is looking at him with one eyebrow canted upwards. It’s the same look she gets when she wants to know who broke into the last cookie in the jar, but Danny’d watched her perfect that look over the years and so was partially immune to it. She finally gave up after a few seconds, shrugging. “Just warn me before he becomes my responsibility.”

“Right,” he agrees absently, watching the stairs and waiting to see when Claude comes down. “Excuse me.”

He takes the stairs two at a time — something he’s gonna pay for because they’ve been trying to break the boys of that habit for years — and pushes Claude’s door all the way open.

The bed is empty, Claude's boxers still laying in the sheets like he’d slipped out of them before getting out of bed, only there’s no sign that he’s showering or anything else.

Danny’s on his knees checking under the bed on the off chance when a pointed nose pokes him in the ass. He jumps a little, turning to see the puppy staring at him, tail wagging slowly.

“Hey, Little Guy,” he offers after a few seconds. “Um. I don’t suppose you can tell me how you got here, can you?”

Promptly, as though responding, the puppy jumps onto the bed, nosing at Claude’s abandoned boxers and whining.

Okay, that’s gross. “Get away from those; you don’t know where they’ve been.”

If a dog could look disapproving, this one would. It was a strangely human expression, at any rate, and he nosed the boxers again, shoving his pointed nose into the waistband, as though trying to crawl inside them.

“Stop that! Claude doesn’t want dog fur inside his clothes!” he scolds, taking the boxers away and tossing them towards the laundry. The puppy shows his teeth, little tiny milk teeth that are still curiously white, and something about that expression would look familiar to Danny if he was paying more attention. Instead he was poking his head into the bathroom. It didn’t look like it had been used recently.

“Hey, Dad!” Carson peers in as Danny’s examining the towels to see if any of them seem wet. “Dad! We get to keep him, right? Mom said he’s Claude's, but Claude’s okay with us playing with his dog, right?”

“Please?” Cam looks as though his heart will break if Danny says no, so he nods and gestures.

“Take him outside with Zora and Zoey.” Luckily his two dogs are used to rolling with whatever the universe throws at them. If they were jealous there might have been some serious snit fits. “Make sure you don’t break him.”

Cam all but hauls the puppy off the bed, and it squeaks a little, looking at Danny with huge eyes as they drag him outside.

“Don’t neglect Zora and Zoey!” he calls as an afterthought, and then goes back to digging around. Claude’s phone is on the nightstand, no use calling him then.

“Did Claude really get a dog?”

Shit, he’d somehow forgotten about that whole third son thing. “I assume so, yes.”

Caelan looks nothing if not skeptical. “Without saying anything to any of us? I saw how you talked to Mom; you weren’t sure where it came from, either.”

He lifts his head and looks at his oldest. “Maybe he wanted it to be a surprise. Maybe he found it on the sidewalk. I’m not certain. We can ask him when he comes back.”

“Where did he go?” Caelan had a great future in store in the legal profession: he somehow read every little doubt and confusion in Danny’s face.

“I’m sure he’ll be back.” It’s not an answer, and Caelan looks like he realizes that, but he lets it go with a little crooked shrug.

\\\

Claude isn’t back. Not the rest of the day, not even into the evening. Danny's starting to get worried; Claude has never disappeared like this, not to where no one, not even James or Richie, knows where he is. Not with his cell phone still sitting beside his bed.

The puppy seems to be adapting okay, considering the circumstances. He's eating out of a cereal bowl since Danny doesn't exactly have an over abundance of dog dishes, and he's been leaving Zoey and Zora alone for the most part.

He's a gorgeous dog, thick red fur and feet promising that he's gonna be pretty good sized when he grows up. Caelan googled him halfway through the day, and the closest they can figure is an Irish Setter. His fur is a little too ginger, a touch curly, so probably mixed in with something wire-haired.

It's late when Danny sends the boys to bed, and he stays up, waiting to hear from Claude. The puppy is in his lap, head pillowed on his thigh while Zoey glares balefully from the floor. He realizes she probably should have first dibs, since she was here first, but something about the weight of the puppy in his lap reminds him of Claude when he falls asleep during a movie, and it's comforting.

He has to decide what to do with the puppy. Danny really can't keep it, he knows that. He has to make a choice soon; it's unfair to the boys to keep him much longer since he can't stay. Hell, the puppy doesn't even have a name, it’s not like Danny’s planning to keep him.

The puppy whines, pushing his face into Danny's belly and nuzzling at him gently. He scratches absently at his ears, trying to ignore the twisting sickness in his stomach. He misses Claude. He's worried.

"Dammit, Claude," he mutters. "This is stupid, just come home."

The puppy stands, gets off the couch and pads out. Danny is moping even more because now he’s alone and cold when he feels Claude's phone vibrate in his pocket.

Hope swells sharp and eager in his belly as he scrambles it out, but the number on the screen is . . .

His?

The call is coming from his own house? Why does that feel like the beginning of a really bad horror movie?

Danny stares at the phone, bites the (hopefully) metaphorical bullet and answers slowly. "Claude?"

A muffled "woof" greets him.

"Who is this?"

The line goes dead. A few seconds later Danny hangs up as well, more confused and scared than before.

The phone starts ringing again. He fumbles to answer it, and this time the woof is louder. It has a weird echo, and when he glances up the puppy has the phone in his mouth. He's staring at Danny defiantly, teeth closed gently over the phone. He sets it down, very deliberately “woofs” at him.

Danny hangs up, never looking away. The puppy makes a snorting sound, scratches his paw across the keypad for a second, and then the phone is ringing again.

He must be tired, there is no way this is happening. “You cannot possibly know how to use a phone.”

Except when he hangs up the puppy promptly redials.

“Stop it,” Danny says finally, eyes narrowed. “Claude might be trying to call, I can’t have you playing and tying up the line.”

At the mention of Claude’s name the puppy barks, a single high and whining sound that echoes across the room. He flinches. The boys deserve to sleep. “Stop it. Claude . . .”

Another bark, this time accompanied with a little puppy dance.

“Why do I feel like you want to tell me something?” Danny’s staring at the puppy hard, trying to understand how in the hell the dog is communicating with him, period. “I don’t have time for games, I have to know what happened to Claude.”

He swears the puppy rolls his eyes. And barks again, stamping his feet in an awkward little shuffle. He’s like Claude, all restless energy only vaguely restrained.

It must be because he’s tired. There’s no way his mind would ever make a leap in logic like this if he was fully rested. “Claude?”

The puppy’s bouncing now, up and down, nails clicking on the wood floor as he bounces his upper body off the floor. He woofs.

“Okay. Dear God, I hope no one is taping this.” Danny crouches down, closer to eye level. “Bark once if you understand me.”

“Woof.”

When nothing else is forthcoming he scrubs his hair off his forehead, panic rising hot and acidic in his throat. “No way. No fucking way. Bark three times.”

The puppy does, slowly and clearly.

Danny can feel that his eyes are the size of dinner plates. “Bark Nickelback?”

It’s rough, but that’s totally the tune to “Photograph” right there, and there’s only one person on the planet he knows who is so unapologetic about his love of Nickelback.

“Holy fuck,” Danny gasps, falling backward onto his ass. He lands hard against the hardwood, feels the shock of it radiate up his spine through his tailbone. He’d never believed someone could take themselves out with desperate flailing before, but _ow pain_.

The puppy. Claude? The puppy Claude?, sits and watches him, head cocked sideways. “No. Non.” Danny’s lapsing into French because there are simply not enough words in the English language to deal with what he is feeling right now. It’s too huge, it’s too much. It’s too much and he can’t deal with it, not at the moment, not when the person he’d depend on to help him is currently the source of his distress.

Danny reaches a shaking hand out for his phone. Claude drops it into his palm.

\\\

“Someone better be dead.”

Everything comes spilling out in a rush that Danny can’t control. “Mais. Quelque chose est arrivé à Claude. Je ne comprends pas . . . ” Danny makes a face at himself, gripping his phone with both hands to keep it from shaking away from his ears. His arms are trembling.

“What the fuck are you on about? Shouldn’t you be getting your old man sleep?” Strangely Richie actually does sound like he might have been sleeping when Danny called, and how’s that for a trip?

Dannye has to take several breaths, take a few seconds to put the words into order inside his head. He hasn’t had to do that since he was young. Maybe he should have just called someone who spoke French to begin with. “Well, I would. I would like to be.” He has no idea how to say it. He can’t even think it without feeling like he’s lost his mind, let alone speak it out loud to Richie. “I don’t . . . Something’s happened to Claude.”

“Did you break him?” Richie sounds intrigued; Danny sorta wants to punch him at the moment.

“Non, I did not break him,” Danny snarls, and Claude’s lips lift off his teeth just a little bit in agreement. “He’s. Um. He’s not feeling like himself right now?”

“Is he sick or something?”

“He’s a puppy?”

The line goes quiet for a little while, then Richie sighs. “Danny, I told you guys at the start of the season I had no interest in your sex lives, and that hasn’t changed. At all. Also, fuck you for bragging.”

“Fuck you. I mean Claude is a puppy. Four legs, tail, fur, the works. I. Hang on.” Claude sits still while Danny snaps the photo, head tilted and eyes narrowed in a way that looks distinctly Claude to Danny, though he’s not sure that anyone who doesn’t know Claude as well as he does will pick it up. He snaps the photo and texts it to Richie, waits for him to receive and open it.

“All that proves is that you’re insane and decided you needed yet another helpless creature in your life to watch over,” Richie says after a few seconds.

Danny can’t help it, he’s tired and wants to go to bed. “Shut up, if that were true I’d have tried to move you and Carts in years ago. That’s Claude, Richie. Something happened to him overnight, I woke up and he was . . . You gotta . . . Je ne . . . I don’t know what to do. I mean, is there anything to do?” He knows his voice sounds lost, sounds broken and scared, and that has to mean something. He’s Danny Briere. He’s survived divorce and concussions and being drafted by the fucking _‘Yotes_ , he should be able to handle this. Except that this is Claude, and something goes weak inside when he thinks of Claude.

There’s a long period of silence, Danny’s not sure what Richie’s doing but he hopes it’s doing something useful. Danny just needs someone to depend on for a second, just a split second so he can pull himself together again, and he’s fresh out of options.

“Okay. Okay, Danny. There’s. There’s not much we can do about it right now, right? Right. So just. Just hang tight, okay. Maybe he’ll. Fuck, I dunno. Maybe he’ll sleep it off or something. That’s when it happened, right? When you were sleeping? So just. Give it a little time. I’ll call a few people, see if there’s anything anyone can think of that can be done.” Richie is using his Captain Voice, the one he uses when they’re down in the third and he knows, just _knows_ that they can do this. It’s the voice he uses when he needs people to listen, to believe in him, and Danny calms instantly. The fans can say what they want to say, Mike is one hell of a Captain.

“What, like a witch doctor?” Danny asks, his voice distant and vaguely hysterical sounding.

“I figured I’d start with Johnny, actually. Call in the big guns if we need them.”

The laugh burbles out of his throat before he can stop himself. He must be tired — that’s not even vaguely funny. “Okay. Okay, call me if. If anyone has ideas.”

“Will do.”

“Thanks, Mike.”

He makes a soft, vaguely soothing sound in the back of his throat. “Try and get some sleep, okay? Give me time to work the lines on my end. Just don’t fucking call me until at least noon.”

Danny chuckles softly, hangs up. His hands have stopped trembling so bad, he feels like he’s in control of his tongue for the moment. That’s good enough. That’s the best he can hope for.

“Ready for bed?” he asks Claude, then feels like a horrible person because normally the dogs aren’t allowed to sleep on the bed. But. Well, he’s not a dog. He’s Claude. And at least Claude like this can sleep with Danny when the boys are over. It feels amazing, and tears prick at his eyes for a second or two when he remembers why, exactly, Claude is sleeping with him tonight.

\\\

The doorbell goes off at about six AM, and Danny comes slamming down the stairs prepped and prepared for murder. Claude trails after him, tail tucked low and lips lifting off his teeth in a warning snarl, just in case one look at Danny isn’t enough to make the person on the doorstep turn tail and run.

“If this is anything less than life and death you are a dead man.” He jerks the door open, blinks. Rubs his eyes, and then focuses again.

Sidney Crosby is on his doorstep, Pens hat pulled low on his head with the tips of his ears peeking out of his hair. They’re already red from the chill. He’s clutching a leash in one hand and a collar that looks like it’s been attacked by a Lady Gaga fan with a bedazzler in the other. He waves the collar just a little bit.

The funny thing is, even though it’s Sidney Crosby on his doorstep with a collar and leash at six in the morning, it is also no more surreal than anything else that’s happened to Danny up to this point. He tries to peek around him, but there’s no one else out there. Just Sidney. Crosby. What the hell?

Danny crosses his arms over his chest and gives Sidney his most menacing look. It’s dulled somewhat by his bedhead, and the general fuzziness of being without coffee, but he’s been a father for a long fucking time.

It’s pretty damn menacing. “Why are you here?”

“Hi.” Crosby smiles a little bit, blink and you’ll miss it quick. “So, Mike called Johnny. And since Johnny lives a fair distance away he called me. He said Giroux had been turned into a puppy, so I brought you a collar and leash. I figured you were set for the toys and food stuff.”

Sidney doesn’t seem the least bit phased by anything that he’s saying. And Danny’s seen his commercials, there’s no way he’s hiding acting talent anywhere, so it must really be that he’s not that shocked by what he’s saying. The way he’s handling this is actually pretty admirable for having just heard about it six hours ago. Danny’s had a day and he’s nowhere close to being that calm about anything. He takes the offered leash and collar, weighs them in his hands while Claude peeks around his knees. That collar really is heavy, it’s like lead with all those rhinestones. “Um. Thank you? You should probably come in, there might be some sort of scandal if neighbors realize who you are. Or, y’know. If they see your hat.”

“Sorry about the collar. I know it’s a bit much.” Sidney shoves his hands in his pockets, shoulders a little slumped as he makes his way into the entrance but no further.

“A little?” Danny agrees, kneeling down to buckle the collar around Claude’s neck. Claude sneezes at him, shakes himself out to settle the collar comfortably and then pretends to promptly collapse under its weight.

Sidney laughs that ridiculous laugh of his, the one that’s almost annoying enough to qualify as chirping. “When I started planning this out I sorta assumed Semin would be the one who got turned into a puppy, and he’d love a collar like that.”

There are so many things that make no sense in that sentence, it’s hard to pick just one. “What?”

“He and Ovechkin seem to have a talent for pissing off a variety of people; I figured it was inevitable, and it’s vitally important to be prepared for all possible contingencies, including the one where someone turns into a puppy.”

Danny stares. Only Crosby would have a plan in place for that, seriously. He’s starting to have serious doubts that he’s human. “You’re taking this very well.”

“Well. I mean, he’s not my --”

If he says boyfriend, Danny will punch him in his ridiculous teeth.

“-- teammate, so I can sorta look at it from the outside, so to say.” Sidney crouches, offers Claude his hand to sniff at. Danny’s still not established how much of Claude is Claude, and how much of him is puppy, but apparently enough of him is puppy for him to sniff at Sidney’s fingers for a few moments before allowing him to scratch over his ears a little bit. “How long has it been like this?”

“About twenty four hours, now,” Danny decides, looking at his watch. “Richie thought he might change back overnight, but obviously that didn’t happen. I don’t even know how this happened, let alone how to fix it.”

Sidney makes a non committal sound, leaning back on his heels and watching Claude like he’s a play he needs to dissect. “And you’re sure it’s Claude?”

“Positive. He kept calling me last night until I figured out what he was trying to tell me. And, well. He’s just Claude, I can just tell.” Danny doesn’t know how to explain it any better, because he doesn’t know himself. He just knows that there’s something about Claude that he could never mistake, never miss, and this puppy is him.

“Alright. You’d know better than I would,” Sidney concedes. He’s handling it really well, it almost makes Danny wonder what goes on in the Pens roster when they’re in the off season. “Do you know why? Can you think of anything, like has he been acting weird or going places he shouldn’t?”

“Or pissing off black magicians?” Danny shakes his head. “I need coffee, want some?”

Sidney’s prissy little face must get pretty old pretty quick. “No, thank you.”

“Yeah, okay.” He heads towards the kitchen, Claude bouncing to his feet and following after him, tail wagging hopefully. Sidney rolls to his feet and follows them into the kitchen, casting one look around and then perching on a stool across the island while Danny bustles about making coffee. As an afterthought he slides a glass at Sidney, who stands up and gets his own water.

“I don’t know what to do,” Danny admits slowly, measuring the grounds. “I have no idea. I don’t know how it happened, I have no idea how to fix it. What if he’s like this forever?”

“That’ll be a disadvantage to your line,” Sidney admits slowly, leaning against the counter as he drinks.

Danny whirls on him, almost ready to scream “My line, what about my life?” but he stills when he remembers that, well. This is Sidney Crosby. As far as he’s concerned, line and life are more similar than just one letter.

“Among other things,” Danny agrees after a moment spent composing himself. “What will I tell the team, what will I tell the kids, they can’t just think Claude ran off on them . . .”

“Dad?”

Danny pauses in midstep, head pivoting up towards the stairs. His three boys are huddled at the bottom of the stairs, their eyes wide and open and varying levels of confused.

“Claude’s not home yet, is he . . .”

“Did we do something . . .”

“Is he okay . . .”

“Will he be coming back soon . . .”

“Is that Sidney Crosby?”

It says something about his boys that that’s their last thought. Danny’s very proud of them. “Sidney’s um. He’s here for a visit.” He flinches. He’s really bad at lying to his boys. It’s something he never wants to be good at. “He was in the neighborhood. For. Some reason.”

Crosby waves at them over Danny's shoulder. “Hi.”

Danny keeps waiting for him to say something more, but when he doesn’t he just sighs. Sidney is proving to be no help whatsoever. “What do you guys want for breakfast?”

“Pancakes!” Cameron decides at the same moment Carson wants eggs, and that devolves into a scuffle that Danny has to break up. Claude tries to help, but he mostly just succeeds in getting in the way, tripping both of them until Danny pushes him away with his foot. Claude slinks away to drink some water from his bowl, then curls up in front of the back door and whines.

Sidney ends up eating breakfast with them before leaving to drive back to Pittsburgh, and it’s nice if for no other reason than he distracts the boys enough that they don’t ask about Claude again until after he’s driving away.

“Dad?” Cameron tugs on the edge of his t-shirt, looking up at him with huge eyes. “Dad? Claude’s gonna come back, right? I mean. I miss him.”

“We all miss him,” Caelan assures his brother, looking at Danny with defiance, as though he’s daring him to deny it. He’d spent most of breakfast staring at Sidney, as though gauging him to see if he was gonna try and take Claude’s place.

Claude nuzzles into Caelan’s hand, muzzle pushing at his arm while he whines and licks his fingers. Caelan scratches at his head while Claude whines and snuggles against him, and Danny bites his lips. Even now, even when they think Claude is gone, he’s so close. He’s never going to leave them, not even when he’s like this.

“I know,” Danny says softly. “I’ll figure it out. Somehow. I promise.”

\\\

He’s never been able to take Zora and Zoey for a jog. The New Jersey summer isn’t kind on their smushed in faces, and Zora is never up for more than a leisurely stroll around the block anyway. Danny’d gotten used to jogging alone until Claude moved in, and he’d never realized how much he’d come to depend on him for their early morning runs until he looks down and remembers Claude isn’t gonna be right beside him, singing under his breath as they go.

He clips the leash onto Claude's collar with a sigh, ruffling his head a little. “Boys, I’m going for my run! Don’t open the door for anyone, I’ll be back in an hour or so.” He stares down at Claude, then adds “I’m taking the puppy!” as an afterthought.

“Okay,” Carson agrees as they all stand and watch him stretch out a little, working out his legs while Claude waits patiently at his side.

“At least you don’t have to stretch,” he tells Claude quietly as he closes the door behind them. Claude winks at him and he snorts, tugging gently on the leash as they go.

Claude as a dog is as good a running partner as Claude as a human. He keeps pace easily, allowing Danny to loop the leash lightly around his forearm to take up the slack and then staying there. His tongue is lolling from his mouth, fur glittering as he stretches out his legs to keep up as Danny lengthens his stride. His steady pants are almost as good as the stupid songs Claude sings to himself as he runs. More on key, if nothing else.

The summer air is still cool this early, and with the light breeze it’s pleasant. Danny’s almost able to forget everything, forget the stress and the fear and just let the pavement disappear under his feet as they make their way through the neighborhood, working in a wide circle to bring them back around to home.

\\\

Richie is at his house when Danny jogs up, sitting on the porch with Jeff and watching the boys scuffle across the lawn, shouting advice here and there when he feels like they need it.

“Use your side eyes, Carson!” he calls as Caelan sneaks in from the side in a move he had to have learned from Claude.

“Head up!” Jeff calls a second later to Cam. “Don’t turtle in there, Kid.”

“Do you even know his name?” Danny asks with an eye roll. He’s never heard Jeff call any of his kids anything other than ‘Kid’.

“Sure,” Jeff replies. “Is this Claude?”

Danny’s eyes get wide in panic, but the kids look too busy to be paying attention to anything Jeff is saying.

Richie laughs at him, patting his lap like he expects Claude to climb up.

Seconds later, Claude does. Danny stares at him. “Traitor.”

Claude just pants at him then turns to lick Richie in the face. Richie laughs and pushes at him a little bit, wiping his forehead off. “So, I guess sleeping didn’t work out, then?”

“No,” Danny agrees. “No, it didn’t. The kids are gonna start panicking any minute now.”

Jeff shrugs. “We told him Claude called us, said he was gonna be hanging out with James for a few days.”

“And that’s believable because?”

“It’s more than you’ve told them, and they’re prepared to accept anything that isn’t ‘I don’t know’.” Richie fiddles with Claude’s ears a little before scratching at his shoulder blades. “He’s kinda a floppy little puppy, isn’t he?”

Danny tries to keep from getting jealous. It’s ridiculous. Richie would never be snuggling Claude if Claude were human, there’s no reason to be seeing green. “Yeah, he is. Richie . . . What’re we gonna do when training camp starts up again, if he’s still like this?”

“At the moment, we don’t really need to worry about that.” Thank Providence and Optimus Prime for Richie as the voice of reason. Danny can feel himself slipping in and out of the neurotically panicky area, and Jeff is just staring at Claude with a weird expression on his face. “We’ll panic if he’s still a puppy then, but that’s still quite some time off, eh? Better to save panic for when we need it.”

Danny looks between them. “That is so easy for you to say. What would you do if Jeff suddenly turned into a puppy?”

Apparently this is the most hilarious thing he could possibly say to them. The boys turn and stare at them curiously, and he snatches Claude’s leash, tugging him away. “We’re going to get a tag.”

“Awesome collar, by the way!” Jeff calls to him as he heads for the garage, and Danny can’t keep from rolling his eyes at that. Of course.

\\\

“And what would you like the tag to say?”

Danny looks down at Claude, who’s watching him with huge eyes. He’s obedient on the end of his leash, always obeying the slightest tug to his collar. “Um. Just put my name on there. And my number.” He writes it down for accuracy, and the girl goes to program it into the engraving machine, returning with a milkbone that she offers Claude with a big smile.

“That’s a big collar for such a little guy,” she teases, letting him take the milkbone out of her hand. Claude chops it happily and Danny tries to resist gagging. Apparently being a dog affects your sense of taste. Not that there hadn’t been times when he’d been hungry enough he’d considered the dog treats, when he was first learning to cook for himself. Last year.

“Uh, yeah. Si . . . someone else picked it out for him, I think it was meant to be a joke.” He smiles down at Claude, who pants cheerfully at him. On his face, it almost looks like a smile.

“What’s his name?” She’s scratching over his ears; Claude leans into her with a happy sigh as his tail thumps heavily on the hardwood floors.

This is an unexpected obstacle. Danny stares at her for a moment. She doesn’t look like she recognizes him, but him blurting out “His name is Claude” is sure to cause a few raised eyebrows if he’s wrong and the story becomes viral. “Roo. His name is Roo.”

“Oh, that’s just darling.” She ruffles his ears, lifting them up onto his head and letting them flop down in front of his eyes. Claude shakes his head out and licks at her face and she laughs, pushing him away and wiping her mouth. “Right for the lips, Roo! You sure you’re Irish and not French?”

Danny’s hand tightens on the leash convulsively. “I think the tag is done?”

She looks up, pops back to her feet. “Yep, sounds like. Have you gotten him microchipped yet? That’s the most surefire way to get them back, especially since he can probably slip that collar until he grows a bit.”

“Um. Not yet.” It seems the safest thing to say when all he wants to do is snap “Claude is not my _pet_.”

“You need anything else? Chew toys, food, training treats?”

“No.” Buying stuff like that is too much like agreeing this might be permanent. Danny gets out his wallet and pays the paltry amount for the tag, twisting it onto Claude’s collar when he gets into the parking lot.

“I’m sorry, Claude,” he whispers, pressing his forehead against the puppy’s, fingers curled tight around his velvet soft ears. “I’m so fucking sorry. I’m gonna take care of you, okay?”

Claude just licks his face, sweet and open and so just like Claude that all Danny can do is bury his fingers into Claude's fur and hold on.

\\\

When he gets back Richie and Jeff are still there, playing video games with the boys in the den, trash talking and censoring each other as they jostle for position. They stare at him with huge eyes that rival Claude’s when he walks in, and before he knows it he’s ordering delivery enough for everyone, even a cooked chicken breast and some rice for Claude.

It feels wrong in a million different ways. Not just because it’s Mike and Jeff across the table instead of Claude, even though Carts keeps making inappropriate comments and Mike keeps shushing him with a snort and a shrug of ‘What can you do?’. Not because they’re bumping shoulders and kicking each other and basically being more blatant than he and Claude could ever dream of being, inside his own house with his kids at the table. That’s fine, Danny’s good with that. Mostly.

It’s Claude. Danny’s used to being able to look over at him, catch his eye and watch that soft little blush flush across his cheekbones when Danny strokes his shin with his foot. He’s so used to Claude making jokes, looking over and making Danny crack up while he sits there and grins like sunshine. He misses the silly things Claude says, the moments when he says or does something that reminds Danny how painfully young and carefree he still is, the moments that flow seamlessly into him acting decades older than he really is. Danny misses Claude so deep it feels like burning.

Mike and Jeff laugh and joke with the boys as they eat, and Danny sits silently, feeding Claude off his plate. Claude licks at his fingers each time he does, quiet gratitude, and Danny feels his chest tighten as it hits him that, hey, maybe this is his life from now on. Him and his boys, the team on the ice but everything with an empty space built in because Claude is no longer in their lives in that role. There’s a future with Danny and his puppy with that stupid collar Crosby bought him until there was no way he could look at Claude and think anything except ‘dog’, until Claude gets old and Danny loses him like he’s gonna lose Zoey and Zora someday. And he tries to remind himself that hell, Claude’s still alive right now, he’s not dead or anything and fails miserably at convincing himself that it’s a perfectly reasonable compromise.

\\\

Danny wakes up early the next morning, and he dreads opening his eyes, but does it anyway.

Claude’s lying next to him, snuffling softly, his fur rustling a bit as he breathes. That isn’t at all reassuring, except that it proves he hasn’t gone insane.

Obviously, just waiting for the weirdness to wear off is not going to work.

“C’mon,” he whispers, getting out of bed and stroking down Claude’s side gently, smoothing his fur. “Hey, Claude. Let’s get the jog done early, okay? Then we can. I dunno. Google this or something.”

Claude stretches, his collar glinting in the light as he shakes himself out, chiming lightly in the still air. Danny smiles at him, feels that tug inside his chest he always feels when he looks at Claude, and there’s a touch of melancholy there as he wonders if he’ll ever get to see Claude all ruffled and sleepy and back on two legs. It’s one of his favorite sights in the whole world, the way Claude's eyes slowly light up as he wakes up for real, the way he stretches himself out in a way that’s so totally not doglike. Danny just misses Claude, and it tugs so painfully inside his chest that he can’t breathe.

Danny gets into his shoes and shorts, tosses on a t-shirt and takes Claude’s leash in hand. He waits patiently while he clips it on him, and Danny grabs his keys before he closes the door and locks it.

This time the jog is a little shorter — when the boys are sleeping he doesn’t like to be gone as long. It’s harder for them to wake up without him there. They still get a little worried, a little anxious, nerves and abandonment that he doesn’t expect to leave them any time soon, and he doesn’t want to compound that by not being there when he should be.

Claude directs him a little bit — this was always one of his favorite jogs when he . . . this is one of his favorite jogs, and he takes off down the road at a steady clip, daring Danny to keep up. It’s so much Claude that he can’t resist a laugh, speeding up his pace even though he knows he’ll pay for it later, matching Claude as he goes.

Claude turns to look at him over his shoulder, doggy grin in place as his tongue flaps out of his mouth, and Danny goes to yell a warning that comes out a split second too late. He loses his footing on the uneven sidewalk, legs scything out from under him and sending him into a graceless tumble that has him head over heels like something out of Bambi, end over end until he comes to a stop.

All in all it takes maybe three to five seconds from the warning to Claude sprawled all over the sidewalk, and Danny wants to laugh a little bit before he hears the high, constant whine coming out of Claude.

When he gets to him Claude has struggled to his feet, but he’s holding his front paw up, whining low and deep in his throat. It’s exactly the same sound Claude as a Human makes when he’s hurt, desperate to hide his discomfort but unable to entirely silence the sharp sounds of pain in his throat.

It has Danny feeling shaky, dropping to his knees in front of him and reaching gently for the injured leg as Claude gimps his way to his feet, paws braced wide to support himself when his foreleg refuses to take any of his weight.

“Hey, hey,” he whispers, reaching out to Claude again, slower this time. “Hey hey hey, no, stay stay. Just let me look at it, okay? It’s okay, Claude. Just let me see.”

Claude is looking at him with that defiant look, the one he gets when Danny trails after him picking up his dishes and socks. It’s a quiet refusal to be treated like a child, like Danny can’t help treating him sometimes, because there’s a reason he has three kids and two dogs. Danny just has to protect, take care, fucking nurture if you want to call it that, and he doesn’t have any shame at all in that because he is what he is. But Claude . . . isn’t one to accept it. Except now, when he needs it, because Danny won’t back down this time.

He sees the change in his eyes when he finally just lifts his paw out, ducking his head as though he’s a real dog, and eye contact is still verboten. He offers Danny his paw and he manipulates it a little. Claude whines softly, a steady stream of sound he’s probably not conscious of making, and Danny feels his heart get tight.

“I’m gonna carry you home, okay?” he asks softly, smoothing his fur back on his head. “Then we’ll take you to the doc . . . vet. We’ll take you to a vet, and they’ll get you all patched up, okay? Will you let me carry you home?”

Claude lowers his head and nods, the gesture strange on a dog’s body, but unmistakable.

“Let me call Sylvie, okay? I don’t want the boys to worry about anything, so I’m just gonna ask her to take them to the beach for the day or something.” And he pulls out his phone and does just that, apologizing because no, he didn’t plan this, but taking care of the injured puppy is gonna take over a chunk of his day, and the boys will go crazy hanging out in the emergency vet’s office all day. She agrees with a small sigh, promises to come get them for the day, and Danny thanks her every way he can, until she hangs up on him “just to get you to be quiet, Daniel.”

Claude’s not heavy, not by a long shot. Danny tucks away his phone, slings him into his arms and settles him as comfortably as he can, clutched tight to his chest. Claude rests his head over his heart and sighs, relaxing into his arms and allowing Danny to make his slow, quiet way back home. He murmurs nonsense to him, soft and meaningless in a mixture of French and English, just little sounds he can remember his mother making for him when he was sick. Claude seems to appreciate it, closing his eyes as his whining slowly tapers off.

When he gets home the boys are gone with their mom; it took him longer than he would have liked, but he thanks every trainer he’s ever had that his upper body was up to the challenge of lugging Claude all the way home. The puppy is limp in his arms, totally trusting, and Danny fumbles the door open before carrying Claude to the couch, setting him gently onto the leather seats and smoothing his ears back.

“Hang on, I’m gonna go call the vet. I’m gonna take care of you, Claude. Are you okay with that?”

He nods again, eyes closed as the whining starts again, and Danny snatches his phone out of his pocket, walks into the kitchen so that Claude won’t hear how badly his voice is shaking.

He’s explaining (lying) the situation to Dr. James — yes, he has his shots, Claude just takes him to a different vet, he just really needs his leg looked at — when he hears a soft, pitiful sound coming from the living room.

“He’s done something to his paw, he’s obviously limping and he can’t put weight on it. It might be an ACL, maybe a sprain. Can dogs sprain their wrists?” He’s rambling, diagnosing rather than letting the vet do her job, but she’s patiently asking him for the third time if he can bring the dog in when he walks into the living room to see Claude, laying on his back and blinking up at the ceiling, cradling his wrist to his chest. His legs are drawn up like he’s trying to clutch his pain into his body, and he’s making the same little distressed sounds through parted lips.

“Um. I may need to call you back,” he says softly, hanging up before he hears her response.

Claude rolls his eyes to him, gives him the weakest smile he’s ever seen on his face, and mutters “At least it’s the off season, right?” in a breathy little voice. His hair is mussed all to hell, like it’s been petted, and Danny has to restrain himself from jumping on top of him and tangling his fingers into the wiry strands. He wants to touch him so bad his fingers burn with it, like poison ivy, but it’s wrong because Claude’s hurt, he needs attention.

At least until he holds his arms out to Danny, his face pale and drawn and a little rueful, then all bets are off because he has to touch him.

Claude melts against his lips, pliant as fried butter against him as he arches into him, but Danny is careful to keep distance between their bodies, keep from crushing Claude’s injured wrist between them. His hand cups Claude’s cheek for a moment, stubble scratching at his palms and so different from the softness of his fur that he shivers, just shakes and then shakes apart, straddling Claude’s waist and bearing him down onto the sofa.

He’s warm under him, like he’s still carrying too much body temperature, holding his body careful as his good hand tangles into Danny’s hair and holds him there. He nips at his lips, all demanding and sharp, unrelenting until Danny deepens the kiss, pulls him in and licks into his mouth, moaning deep into his chest and heart.

“Claude,” he whispers into his ear, the side of his neck, his throat. Pressing kisses in a line down the fluid curve of his throat, biting hard into his shoulder. Claude tastes like sweat and flesh, a little musky but Claude and it’s so delicious he could lose himself in it for hours. Except Claude is whining, trying to clutch him closer, and Danny shoves himself up, looking down at the young man sprawled soft and vulnerable under him, mussed and tired and Claude.

He glides his hand up his side, skimming over the muscle and feeling it jump and shiver under him, stretched tight over bone. Up, over Claude’s shoulder and bicep, cradling the elbow of his injured wrist and pressing, pinning it down into the couch.

“Don’t move,” he whispers. “Not this arm, not an inch. You move, we stop.”

Claude makes a small sound in his throat, wriggles a little and then nods. “Danny,” he whispers, and his voice is raspy, unused or like he’s been deep throating him for hours. “Hold me.”

He doesn’t need to say more, because Danny understands. Understands the light behind Claude’s eyes and he tugs on the collar a little, chuckling. “We’re gonna have to give this back to Sid.”

“Maybe not. He can afford it,” Claude teases, leans up and kisses him deep, until Danny’s pressed up against him, his weight on it forcing Claude’s injured arm into the couch. He can feel the younger man under him, feel all the energy and vibrancy under his skin, the smooth movements as he wriggles to get Danny settled between his legs, hooking his ankles around the back of his thighs.

He leans down and kisses him, thrusting against him absently, without purpose. “Don’t move,” he murmurs into his mouth, reminding him as he ghosted his lips over the sharp line of his law. “Don’t move, or we stop.”

“Danny,” he agrees, a touch breathless, and stretches himself out so that his spine is drawn longer, the strong line of his arm like a dare as he raises it up and keeps it there, lets Danny press hard into his elbow to keep him pinned.

“Merde,” he whispers, eyes fixed on him and just absorbing, wishing he could just sit and watch this for hours, the long and lean line of Claude’s body, pale against a dark sofa. There’s nothing bulky or overdrawn about him and it’s perfect, he rolls his hand up and down his side in a light stroke, watching goose bumps rise over the flesh as he almost touches, teases.

“Danny, please,” he whines, and Danny covers his lips without another word, holding him down and rumbling into his mouth, letting Claude thrust against him. They’ve got a poor angle for it, but that doesn’t seem to matter to Claude at all, he’s making sounds that are half pleasure and half incoherence, rolling under him like thunder on a sunny day.

Danny bites his lip, a quick snap of teeth that splits his lip and has him bleeding sluggishly as Danny pulls away, watches him for a second. “Too much moving, Claude.”

His eyes go wide, dark with pupil. “Sorry. Sorry, Danny, I won’t . . .”

His tongue darts out, cleans up the small trail of blood running down his chin. “Shhhh. ‘Yes, Danny’, ‘No, Danny’, and ‘Please, Danny’. That’s all you need to say, as long as you stay still.”

“Sorry, Danny,” he whispers again, stretching himself out so that his arm is safely above him, immobile. “Yes, Danny.”

God, he’ll never get over the way his name sounds in Claude’s mouth, like he wants to lick it out with honey. Instead he moves away, leaving Claude spread prone across the couch, watching him with eyes that look a touch too big on his face. He shucks his shirt quickly, watches Claude’s tongue dart across his lips as he works off his shorts, and he knows what Claude expects. What Claude wants, so rather than give it to him he settles himself a safe distance away on the couch, and decides to give Claude what he needs instead.

Slow, careful attention. His fingers skimming butterfly soft across the fine hairs on his thighs, tracing over his kneecaps and down his calves. Nudging his legs apart until he can settle more comfortably, coaxing them over his shoulders.

“Danny?” Claude asks, his voice soft, before Danny looks up his body at him, eyes burning dark, and he gasps, biting his lip. “Yes, Danny. Please, Danny.”

“Good,” he agrees, smile tweaking his lips for a moment before he leans forward, mouths at Claude’s thigh, sucking a soft red mark into the skin just to see it color his flesh for a moment before it fades. Claude whines, tosses a bit and Danny sucks harder, allows himself to indulge in that moment and for just a moment before moving on.

Claude is thrashing beneath him, but his arm is obediently where Danny demanded. He knows he's not bluffing, Danny never bluffs these things. His body is all sinew and movement, but he keeps his hand pressed to the cushions with enough force that his shoulders are denting into the material.

Danny has to take his hands away to shift Claude's hips, lifting and shifting him and he squirms down, walking his shoulders down so that his hips can lift higher in response to Danny's silent request.

He's gasping quietly, chest hitching and jumping silently as Danny's tongue skims over him. He parts him gently, sucking another bruise into his thigh as he waits for Claude to calm, settle. After a few moments he leans forward, pressing his tongue to Claude's hole. His body leaps at the contact and his voice comes out as a barely muffled scream.

"Yes, Danny. Yes. Please, Danny. Please!"

Danny feels his desperation in him as he breathes softly against him, warming the spit chilled skin. "Don't move, Claude."

"No," he agrees, shaking, his legs trembling before they settle on Danny's shoulders, drawing him closer. Danny smiles against his skin, licking into Claude with short, swift jerks of his tongue. Stiff strokes against him and Claude's body relaxes immediately, letting him in with an inarticulate sigh and his free hand pressing deep into his hair, petting and tangling as he grips him like a lifeline.

Danny works saliva into his skin, tongue slicking and sliding, pressing warm and wet and smooth against the vulnerable flesh. Claude's making the most delicious, wanton noises that Danny can't help but reciprocate, deep into his body where Claude thrashes every time he moves.

When he pulls away Claude is flushed, red hot and panting, watching him with eyes that tell him he’s okay, that he’s ready even though all he’s saying is “Yes, Danny Please, Danny" like a mantra.

He likes this side of him.

Pressing into Claude feels like nothing he can compare it to, brilliance and heat and light behind his eyelids, feeling his legs hook over his hipbones and pull him in deeper. It’s not a fantastic angle, but he can’t risk putting Claude on his knees, so instead he leans forward, long fingers curling around Claude’s forearm, pressing it down again as he begins to move. Steady snaps of his hips that Claude welcomes with more guttural cries, more whines and pleas and half French curses, working his own body back against him as best he can without leverage.

It’s perfect, it’s all or nothing, and Danny can feel Claude unraveling under him, coming apart and rebuilding as though he’s going to shift again. But he won’t, he’s just Claude and he’s sin and sunshine and Danny may or may not tell him that as he spills inside him, Claude painting their bellies with a high cry.

It’s too hot but Danny collapses against him anyway, lips pressed into his hair and whispering a million different things at once as Claude strokes over his spine, fingers slipping through the sweat there like petting.

“How,” Danny gasps against his throat when his brain resumes its normal function, the question pushing to the forefront of his mind with razor edged clarity. “Claude, how . . .”

“Danny, you’re a caregiver at heart,” Claude whispers, pulling his arm away at last. “I guess. I guess sometimes I have to just realize that, and let you mother me.”

Danny doesn’t smack his ass as hard as he would like, but Claude still jumps and bites his lip, eyes slitting at him.

“No, I mean it. Like. It’s just. It’s what you do, I guess. You take things onto yourself because you can take care of them. You’re a fixer, and . . .”

They’re saved from blatant sentimentality by the ringing of Danny’s phone somewhere down below them. With an angry grunt he digs it out, jamming it against his ear. “What?”

Claude watches his face go through various shades of expression over the course of a few seconds, but all he says is “No, Sidney. You are not getting that collar back, I don’t care what Ovechkin told you,” before he throws his phone out of reach where it can jingle until the boys come home for all he cares.


End file.
